The fear of death
by geekysparkle
Summary: "He doesn't need to take his eyepatch off to know that his partner is dying on him." Birthday is in the hospital following the relapse of his illness and Ratio, for all his knowledge as a doctor, isn't handling it very well. Really heavy and angsty, death is very present and I cried while writing this. You have been warned.


_**Me and small dead fandoms are a thing, okay?**_

 _ **Anygays, set in the last few episodes of S2, after Ratio and Nice's fight and obviously before Birthday is cured.**_

 _ **This fic started as "hey let me take one of these cute hurt/comfort prompts" and went straight to "I think Ratio would have killed himself if Birthday had died" in less than two paragraphs.**_

XxX

Birthday has an uncanny ability to get himself in trouble. Ratio is well aware of this, has known it for almost as long as he's known Birthday which is, to say, way too long for his lifespan. Simply spending time with the blonde has probably shortened his life expectancy by approximately thirty years when rounding down (that one time when he decided to learn ice skating? Five years. At the very least), and seeing as he's unwilling to leave Birthday's side, he's probably going to die of a heart failure before he hits forty.

All in all, Ratio is quite used to Birthday's antics and stupid tricks. This latest one, however, may have taken the remaining less-than-twenty years and all that was left of his sanity, because if Birthday dies at twenty-three in a hospital bed, he's going to follow. He would have maybe lived had Birthday died on the job, _maybe_ , but this? This wasn't supposed to happen, just wasn't - Birthday was supposed to be _healthy_ , the surgery was supposed to be a _success_ and Ratio's prediction of Birthday's premature death by his illness was supposed to be _wrong_ -

But it's happening, right here and now, in the hospital Ratio is working at. Birthday's breaths are shallow and wheezing and he's pale, so, so pale against the white sheets that somehow seem darker than Birthday's translucent complexion. He looks fragile, too fragile to be Birthday. There are dark bruises under his eyes, pronounced next to his anemic pallor. His skin seems paper-thin. Ratio can see blue and purple veins, on eyelids, along the forearms, the neck.

He doesn't need to take his eyepatch off to know that his partner is dying on him.

Birthday sleeps nearly eighteen hours a day, either under the drugs he's constantly being pumped full of, or then simply because he's too exhausted to stay awake. Just _breathing_ seems to drain him of all the energy needed to give Ratio one tired smile.

Sometimes Birthday tries to walk around. Some days he actually has enough strength to sit up on the edge of his bed and take a few steps, sometimes just to the door and sometimes even down the hall to the vending machine. He rarely gets anything, but the fact that he's able to make it that far and _back_ without collapsing is enough. It's Birthday's figurative middle finger to his illness, and it's just as much done for Birthday himself as it is for Ratio.

Those are good days. Then there are medium days, kinda okay days, tired days. There are bad days, and the bad days are horrible for everyone involved. On medium days Birthday can, at the very least, hold a conversation and maybe even sit up at the edge of his bed. But on the bad days he can't. On the bad days he can barely keep his eyes open for long enough for Ratio to check if he's even conscious. On the bad days, painful, wet coughs rattle his thin frame for minutes without a break and leave him a wheezy, heaving mess with blood-stained lips and and a barely-there heartbeat. On the bad days, Nice and Murasaki come visit, sometimes, if they can spare even a little time.

Ratio is well aware that both Nice and Murasaki but especially Nice have their hands full with Hajime and Art and the whole Freemum thing, but he's still grateful for the ten minutes he can sit in his office with Murasaki while Nice stays with Birthday. If he could, he would spend every second of his time in that room, but sometimes listening to Birthday's waning breath gets too much.

Today started as a medium day, but it's going bad and fast. Birthday's attempt to stand up ended with him on the floor hacking up blood. A nurse finds him first, shivering and coughing weakly as if his body didn't have enough strength for even that - and maybe it doesn't. Ratio is there within a minute and still feeling like he's late, he's ten years and then some too late for saving Birthday.

It only gets worse from there.

Birthday has a fever. He's teetering on the edge of unconsciousness and his forehead is clammy with cold sweat, and Ratio is terrified because Birthday has no immune system left to battle an infection. He remembers the pure, mind-numbing fear he felt when Birthday collapsed right at his feet, shaking and coughing and trying so hard, and it's nothing compared to the freezing terror that grips his heart when he sees the number "41.2" on the thermometer.

And Birthday is in so much pain. He whimpers, the noise barely audible, and his hands instinctively move to his chest, where it hurts the most and every breath is pure agony despite the IV dripping morphine into his veins. Something aches in Ratio's chest, too, at the sight and at the sound.

They need to draw some blood in order to determine how to treat this new threat, but in all honesty, Ratio isn't sure if Birthday has enough blood left to draw without killing him. He keeps coughing it up and Ratio doesn't know how long it will take until they're able to find a suitable blood donor for a type O Minimum Holder. Birthday's blood type is already frustratingly difficult to come by due to its stance as a universal donor, but finding a compatible Minimum Holder might prove to be beyond his abilities.

By the time night arrives, Birthday's fever is down to 38.7 and he has vomited twice. He doesn't have the strength to hold himself up, not today, so Ratio has held him up by his bony shoulders while Birthday has dry-heaved and dry-heaved and dry-heaved until finally throwing up water and bile. Though Ratio does consider the lowered fever a victory, it doesn't really improve his mood at all. Birthday is still sick and still dying. He can't get the feeling of Birthday's shoulders against his hands out of his mind - Birthday isn't supposed to feel so _fragile_ , not supposed to feel like a single touch would be able to break his physical form straight into atoms.

It's terrifying.

The visiting hours have ended hours ago when Nice and Murasaki walk in with a convenience store bag with a few onigiri in it. Ratio doesn't know whose money they are using because the Hamatora duo is _broke_ and has been as long as he remembers, not to mention they aren't even accepting jobs at the moment due to the circumstances, but maybe it's Honey and Three, maybe it's Master and Koneko, maybe it's those two kids Nice befriended before shit hit the fan a few months ago.

There's pity in their eyes, and sadness, and Nice looks guilty when he watches Ratio's broken arm. Ratio is too tired to care, too exhausted to blame them. He doesn't remember the last time he ate something, and he doesn't resist when Murasaki plants a plain onigiri in his hand and simply says, "Eat."

They don't have time to stay tonight. Nice visits Birthday's room briefly and comes out looking like he'd seen a ghost in there. Murasaki pats Ratio's shoulder firmly, probably attempting to be reassuring but coming across just as exhausted as Ratio feels.

"Get some sleep," Murasaki tells him, sounding weary himself, He glances at Nice, too, as if his words were directed to the both of them. Nice doesn't seem to notice, but in the dim nighttime lighting he looks exhausted, too. _He's seventeen, for God's sake_ , Ratio thinks. Something in him, some small part that isn't thoroughly occupied by and invested in Birthday, aches at the thought. Nice is six years younger than him, four years younger than Murasaki, and somehow he, too, is caught up in this awful mess. _Let kids be kids_. It's not as if Ratio himself was ever allowed to be a kid, either, but it feels so unfair to take childhood away from children just because they happen to have _potential_ for a Minimum.

"You too," Ratio hears himself saying. Murasaki nods absent-mindedly.

Nice tells him to call if Birthday gets worse, that he doesn't know if they'll be able to come but somebody will. "Take care," he says on his way out.

Ratio finds himself in Birthday's room. The blonde is asleep, and his breathing is audible, but maybe that's what Ratio needs. Affirmation that Birthday is still alive. He falls asleep holding Birthday's hand, and maybe he's just imagining it, but for the briefest of moments he could swear he feels Birthday squeeze his hand.

XxX

 ** _That was a crapload of angst and I'm almost sorry._**


End file.
